Sundance London 2017: Exclusive first look at film festival line-up

From alt-Right revolutionaries to hard-truth documentaries, Sundance London is back with a more political edge than ever before. The Standard exclusively reveals the festival line-up 
Winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for US Documentary: Dina
Ellen E. Jones26 April 2017

Sundance: a film festival in Park City, Utah, where it usually snows and everyone’s too busy heralding the future of cinema to boogie.

It is here that US indie greats Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson and Steven Soderbergh got their starts but who will be next? Since 2012, those who don’t fancy the 5,000-mile trip out west but do fancy seeing the best of tomorrow’s cinema today have enjoyed a curated programme brought to London by festival director John Cooper and director of programming Trevor Groth.

This year’s Sundance Film Festival: London is from June 1-4 and will, for the second time, take place in Picturehouse Central in Piccadilly. “Sometimes when you go to Cannes or Berlin, people can be very hard and critical,” says Clare Binns, Picturehouse Cinemas’ director of programming & acquisition and a veteran of the internal festival scene. “In Sundance there’s a different atmosphere. It’s more about, ‘We love these films, how can we get them to people?’”

This year’s innovations include the Audience Favourite award, voted for by festival attendees. The programme itself is as varied as ever, but with President Trump’s inauguration coinciding with the first day of Sundance in Park City, one topic has been unavoidably resonant. This year’s selection features a film in which a Brooklyn hipster finds her neighbourhood overrun with armed alt-Right revolutionaries. In another, a Mexican immigrant gets into a dinner party row with a brash billionaire businessman.

Yet, as Groth points out, all these films were made long before Donald Trump was even a serious candidate: “What’s interesting is how artists don’t just react to what’s happening right now, they’re sort of out in front. They feel the swell.”

Part-chamber piece, part-dramedy of manners: Dinner at Beatriz
Lacey Terrell

Drama

Beatriz at Dinner

Part-chamber piece, part-dramedy of manners, this year’s festival opener stars Salma Hayek as Beatriz, a Mexican-American from a poor background who finds herself having dinner with a group of businessmen celebrating a lucrative deal. John Lithgow and Chloë Sevigny co-star. “In a very smart and entertaining way it brings up some really vital issues,” says Groth.

The Big Sick

“People always refer independent comedies back to [2006 Sundance hit] Little Miss Sunshine,” says Binns. “But this is the first film I’ve seen and thought, ‘This is what Little Miss Sunshine did’. It’s just so funny and heart-warming.”

Based on the real-life experiences of co-writers Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V Gordon, The Big Sick is a rom-com about a Pakistani-American man and his white American girlfriend, who must negotiate family interference on their course to true love. It’s produced by noted talent spotter Judd Apatow.

Charismatic: The Incredible Jessica James

The Incredible Jessica James

Remember the former Daily Show correspondent Jessica Williams? She has her first lead role as an aspiring New York playwright who is trying to get over a break-up when she meets Boone (Chris O’Dowd), an app designer who’s recovering from his own heartbreak. “I think she’s so dynamic, so charismatic, so smart,” says Groth.

Bitch

“Bitch is pretty original!” laughs Cooper. “And there’s not much we find shocking.” Marianna Palka writes, directs and stars as Jill, an unhappy housewife and mother who, when she finally snaps, assumes the persona of a vicious dog. Jason Ritter is already winning plaudits as the feckless and philandering husband who is forced to take responsibility for keeping his life — and wife — on a short leash. If you saw Palka’s 2008 film Good Dick then no warning will be necessary.

Marjorie Prime

Jon Hamm fans, look no further. He stars in this Black Mirror-episode-that-never-was as a handsome (what else?) robot, programmed to resemble the deceased husband of 86-year-old Marjorie (Lois Smith). “It moved me a lot,” says Cooper. “It opens your mind to sort of a nostalgia about life and ageing in a very interesting, scientific way.”

Sleeper hit: Crown Heights

Crown Heights

The first of two films in this year’s programme named after Brooklyn neighbourhoods, Crown Heights stars Atlanta’s LaKeith Stanfield as Colin Warner, a real-life victim of a miscarriage of justice. Trevor Groth says this Audience Award-winner has got ‘sleeper hit’ written all over it: “I think the combination of the emotional with the politics will work very well with that London audience.”

Bushwick

US indie darling Brittany Snow stars as Lucy, a woman who steps of the subway to discover her Brooklyn neighbourhood is under siege from militia forces. “It’s a really intense action film mixed with timely political issues,” says Cooper.

A Ghost Story

What happens when we die? This 87-minute answer, dreamed up by writer-director David Lowery (Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, Pete’s Dragon) and his stars Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck, is as plausible as any. Even though it does involve a man wearing a bedsheet. Cooper calls is “minimalist with a real emotional impact”, while Binns goes even further: “It’s so different, it’s going to amaze people.”

Walking Out

Parents reconnecting with their children is a Sundance staple, but Alex and Andrew Smith’s Montana-set film reinvigorates that basic bonding tale with a man-against-the elements twist. Newcomer (Josh Wiggins) stars as a son who must assume adult responsibilities when his father (Matt Bomer) is mauled by a bear on a hunting trip. It’s a performance once critic has called “excellent and restrained”.

Wilson

I love Woody Harrelson, you love Woody Harrelson, everybody loves Woody Harrelson; but can we still love him as Wilson? He’s the middle-aged misanthrope struggling to connect with his long-estranged wife (Laura Dern) and a teenage daughter he never knew he had. Craig Johnson (The Skeleton Twins) directs this humane and insightful adaptation of a typically offbeat graphic novel by Daniel Clowes (Ghost World, Art School Confidential).

Documentary

Dina

This year’s winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for US Documentary is an unconventional love story about two adults on the autistic spectrum: “We actually have seen some films with that subject matter before,” says Groth. “But never crafted like this.”

Beautiful and engaging: Chasing Coral

Chasing Coral

In keeping with the environmental concerns of Sundance founder Robert Redford, Chasing Coral is a beautiful and engaging call to arms by Chasing Ice director Jeff Orlowski. It’s also taken on a new resonance post-Trump: “Chasing Coral just looks different after the election,” says Cooper.

Shorts

This year’s UK shorts include Tough, about a mother-daughter cultural misunderstanding, and Londoner Shola Amoo’s Dear Mr Shakespeare. The Sundance Film Festival Short Film Tour, meanwhile, is headed up by Come Swim, the directorial debut of actress Kristen Stewart.

Cult-doc-in-the-making: Icarus

Icarus

Catfish, Exit Through The Gift Shop, Tickled — you know you’ve stumbled across a cult-doc-in-the-making when no one will give you any details. That’s the case with Icarus: “We don’t talk a lot about the actual plot points of it, because it is an exposé, it’s very exciting to watch,” enthuses Cooper. We do know it’s directed by Bryan Fogel, whose investigations into doping in sports lead him to connect with renegade Russian scientist, Dr Grigory Rodchenkov.

Events

Several of the directors and stars are accompanying their films into town, so be sure to stick around for the post-screening Q&As. This year’s highlights include I Get Overwhelmed: From Saints to Ghosts, David Lowery in Conversation, in which the feted director will be explaining how he went from the 2016 big-budget Disney film Pete’s Dragon to this year’s Sundance Selection. Another hot ticket is Independent Film Trumps Reality on this year’s big talking point.

Festival director Cooper heads up a panel featuring the directors of Beatriz at Dinner, Chasing Coral and Bushwick.

Sundance Film Festival: London is at Picturehouse Central, W1 (picturehouses.com/sundance) from June 1-4. Festival passes are available now and individual tickets go on sale May 2

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